


Kisses Like Wine

by Moonraykir



Series: Kiliel Kisses [7]
Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Drunken Kissing, F/M, First Kiss, Fluff, Romance, Romantic Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-27
Updated: 2017-12-27
Packaged: 2019-02-22 07:44:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13162437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moonraykir/pseuds/Moonraykir
Summary: When their wine cellar escape route takes the Company past a trio of tipsy and slumbering elves—including one pretty guard captain—Kíli gets an unexpected chance to bid Tauriel farewell.





	Kisses Like Wine

**Author's Note:**

> This was a prompt fic for @lilly-chan on Tumblr. It got a little out of hand. XD

On the twenty-eighth day of their captivity in Mirkwood, when Bilbo appeared like magic with a wink and the key to his cell, Kíli was elated.

An extended stay in prison was not at all something Kíli had envisioned as part of their heroic quest. The experience had been all the more frustrating since they were now close enough to the Mountain that even Kíli, who had never been to Erebor in his life, could feel its nearness through the soles of his feet. Oh, it was time and past time that they were on their way again.

Still, as he followed Bilbo to the cells of his companions, Kíli could not suppress a feeling of regret nearly as strong as his excitement. Leaving meant not seeing her again, not for a long while, at least.

What had begun as a lighthearted flirtation meant to pass the time of his monotonous captivity had led to feelings of unexpected (and slightly alarming, if he considered what his uncle would say) fondness for the red-haired elf captain with her sweet eyes and even sweeter laugh. And though Tauriel’s feelings were sometimes a challenge to guess thanks to her reserved elvish manners, he had reason to believe she felt an answering warmth for him. She visited him more often than her duties possibly could have required, and lately, there had been that soft, eager smile on her face each time he moved to the door to greet her.

Kíli certainly did not mean his time in Mirkwood to be the last he ever saw of Tauriel. After Thorin’s victorious homecoming, there would eventually be need of alliances, and as a prince, Kíli would make an ideal ambassador to the Woodland Realm. But the time for such negotiations was surely months, if not years, away. He wished he could at least tell Tauriel goodbye for now.

After Bilbo had locked the empty cell behind the last dwarf, he led them all away from the prisons and deeper into the Elvenking’s palace itself. This was an odd escape route, Kíli mused. He’d not have thought going further in would be the way out, but surely Bilbo had learned the layout of the palace well in the month they’d all been here.

Yet as they passed a door that led to what appeared to be a larder, Kíli began to wonder if even their canny burglar had lost his way. And this room they were entering now was some sort of wine cellar. Bottles and casks of wine, mead, cider, and spirits were stacked floor to ceiling.

Kíli was just drawing a breath to ask their hobbit, who was only a pace or two ahead of him, why they’d come here when they rounded a wine rack and he found himself facing three elves seated round a table.

“Dammit, not—” Kíli got out before Bilbo turned and clapped a hand on his dwarven friend’s mouth. The hobbit gave an expressive stare and a shake of the head.

Glancing back to the elves, Kíli now saw that they were all asleep, two of them propped in their high-backed chairs, and the third slumped forward over the table, which was littered with empty bottles and half-drained flagons. Ah. Asleep _and_ inebriated it seemed. Kíli nearly laughed aloud in his surprise and relief. So elves really could get drunk, thank Mahal.

The hobbit beckoned him on, and Kíli crept forward as silently as he could in his heavy boots. He wasn’t taking any chances on keen elvish senses, even if the elves in question were well and truly sauced. Still he couldn’t help sneaking one last amused look as he passed the table, and then he froze so that Óin nearly tripped over him.

He couldn’t see the face of the elf with her head resting on the table, but he recognized that fiery hair spilling over her shoulders. Tauriel?

“Move on, laddie,” Óin whispered loudly.

Wrenching his eyes from Tauriel’s lovely figure, Kíli followed Bilbo down a short stair into a lower cellar. Down here was a row of empty barrels and as more dwarves arrived, Bilbo began gesturing for them to get inside. Kíli lingered at the back of the room near the stairs, only half paying attention to the growing incredulity with which Bilbo’s instructions were met by the rest of the Company.

He tried to tell himself it was unreasonable to be disappointed that he hadn’t been able to do more than steal a quick last glance at Tauriel’s back. Of course he didn’t want to jeopardize their escape by lingering. And what sort of goodbye was it if she didn’t know he’d even been there? But he would have liked one more moment for… Well, he wasn’t sure.

“I’m not a pickled herring ’n’ you can’t treat me like one!” Glóin’s growl cut through Kili’s thoughts.

“Oh, for the love of—” Thorin muttered at Kíli’s side, and then the young dwarf felt a hand on his shoulder. “Kíli, go to the top of the stair while I handle this. If any of those elves so much as twitches an ear, you come back and warn us.”

“Aye, Uncle,” he returned, his annoyance of a moment before instantly melting at his sudden good luck.

Kíli found the elves just as he’d left them. To his relief, the barely hushed argument taking place below them did not carry up here; the swish of the river (which must flow just below the lower cellar) was all he could hear.

After a half minute, Kíli crept forward a few steps and then a few more. He would go just far enough look in her face…

Yet somehow between the angle of the wine rack and the position of her chair, he was within three paces of her before he could see past her shoulder. And then he found that, by some strange perversity, a wave of her hair had slipped down and obscured all but the tip of her nose and the corner of her mouth.

Breath held, Kíli slipped his fingers beneath that coppery curtain and ever so gently eased it back from her face. As he tucked it behind her shoulder, she stirred just barely and gave a soft hum.

Kíli froze, his heart thudding loud in his ears. _Maker, please, don’t let her—_

Tauriel’s lashes lifted and her green eyes met his own.

His stomach dropped. Thorin was going to murder him.

The elf watched him over the pillow of her arm. “Kíli?” she murmured at last, her voice lower, more husky than he’d ever heard it.

“I—” He gulped a breath. “I came to tell you goodbye.” He might as well say it, since there was no secret to be kept now that he’d betrayed everything. What had he been thinking, trying to see her?

“Goodbye?” Her auburn brows narrowed, and she lifted her head at last. “Where are you going?”

She stared, her expression clearly perplexed and even—dare he say it?—a little disappointed.

“Where? Um…” His mind raced as fast as his heart. She hadn’t asked what he was doing here. She hadn’t leapt up to seize him and take him back to his cell. Could it be she was dreaming?

“Nowhere,” he finished softly. He must not wake the other elves. They would be sure to recognize him as an escaped prisoner, even if she did not. “I’ll see you tomorrow. Just… Good night, Tauriel.” It was such an intimate phrase, one he hoped he might get to say again to her one day.

“Kíli, wait.” Tauriel caught him as he stepped back from her. “Don’t. I—” She faltered, lips parted over words she could not find. Her high cheeks, already flushed from drink, colored more deeply, and her rich emerald eyes were fixed earnestly on his.

Oh, it was not fair of her to be so lovely; not fair because her beauty was like an arrow through the heart, leaving Kíli empty, broken with need for her; not fair because how could he help falling in love with her; not fair because he was only a dwarf and could never hope to inspire half—

Tauriel’s hands moved to his collar. “Kiss me,” she whispered, that low, rough note returning to her voice, and Kíli knew this was a plea, not an order.

Her mouth was sweet with wine, and she gave herself in long, full drafts as heady as any true vintage. Her eager hands clung in his shirt, his hair, and her hair fell down against him. He could smell the faint, woodsy spice of it as it brushed his face. Somehow, his arms found their way around her; his palms pressed against the warm brushed suede of her bodice while his fingers tangled in more of her silken locks.

When they broke off, Tauriel remained leaning against him. Her eyes had drifted closed once more and there was a sleepy smile on her lips.

“This is the nicest dream I’ve ever had,” Kíli murmured against her ear.

“Mmm…is it a dream?”

“Yes. You’re asleep now, see?” As thrilled as he was by her kiss, he was deeply relieved to find her drifting back into slumber. He knew how dangerously close he was to disaster, even now.

She nestled closer against his shoulder. “Kíli…”

“Good night, _amrâlimê_ ,” he said. He thought Tauriel smiled.

He waited a few more moments for her breathing to return to a slow, easy rhythm. Then he eased her back onto the table top. Thank Mahal and all the Valar that that elvish wine was strong, he thought as he shifted a flagon to make a space for her to lie without cramping her neck. If she had been any more sober just now— Well, she would not have kissed him, for one thing. He grinned, remembering the taste of her lips. Would she recall any of this tomorrow? Oh, he hoped so.

Kíli turned and then nearly rattled the table as he jumped in surprise. There was the hobbit standing right at his elbow.

“Hers,” Bilbo mouthed, holding aloft a ring of keys, which he then slipped onto Tauriel’s belt loop where Kíli had seen it before. The young dwarf hoped she would not be reprimanded too severely when her prisoners were all discovered missing the next morn.

As Kíli followed Bilbo down the stairs, he ventured, “How much of that did you see just now?”

“Oh, quite enough.” Bilbo’s anxious expression warmed to a boyish grin that was pleased and perhaps ever-so-slightly conspiratorial. “I’ve seen quite enough of you both, indeed.”


End file.
